AI is a technology that has shown potential far beyond its expectation. Today, when we look around, we can witness the amalgamation of AI in every field, from healthcare to arts.  

AI in the field of art has been creating controversies worldwide. While some admire the genius of AI work, others find it hard to give it the necessary credit. Nevertheless, artists, musicians, and filmmakers are researching to figure out the actual potential of AI, and every result is astonishing. 

We have seen several generative AI works taking social media by storm. There are dancers, musicians and writers who seek the help of AI for creative and technical aspects of content production.  

Manhattan’s Alice Tully Hall witnessed the union of AI with one of the most traditional art forms- The Opera. A recent New York Times report delivered the story of the work-in-progress “Song of the Ambassadors” that got a test run with Lincoln Center’s artistic director lending her brain. The work fuses the elements of traditional opera with AI and neuroscience. At the end of the rehearsal, a set of photographs were generated by the brain of the artistic director Shanta Thake, with the help of AI. 

The photographs portrayed flowers- bright, colorful, and fantastical belonging to no known species or genus. It was as if ‘botany and fluid dynamics had somehow merged’, The New York Times wrote. 

Sun, Space and Life 

The “Song of the Ambassadors was created by K Allado-McDowell, who leads the Artists and Machine Intelligence initiative at Google, with the AI program GPT-3. The composer, Derrick Skye, integrates electronics and non-western motifs into his work and the data arrest Refik Anadol contributed AI-generated visualizations.  

Three singers were the ambassadors to the sun, space and life. There was also a percussionist, a violinist and a flute player.  

Artistic director Thake sat on one side of the stage with an EEG monitor on her head was the ‘brainist’ who fed the brain waves into Anadol’s AI algorithm to generate the otherworldly patterns. 

A couple of neuroscientists monitored the brain waves of two audience volunteers with their heads encased in research-grade headsets.  

Children of humanity 

While working with Google, Allado McDowell decided to lead an initiative that collaborated AI with artists. According to McDowell, AI is the children of humanity. They need to learn to love and to be loved. Otherwise, they will become psychopaths and kill everyone. 

One of the earliest partnerships they established was with Anadol. Anadol opined that for the “Song of the Ambassadors”, they are transforming brain activities in real-time into an ever-changing color space. Their artworks also respond to Skye’s music, which alternates between periods of activity and repose. Through the work, they are trying to bring the audience in and out of a space of meditation.  

According to the data analyzed from the results, the neuroscientists at the venue stated that they could understand that the working of the mind exists far outside our head. They opined that human minds extend throughout our bodies and beyond. 

Content and Image source: The New York Times